Athletics is a collection of sporting events that involve

competitive running, jumping, throwing, and walking.[1] The

most common types of athletics competitions are track and
field, road running, cross country running, and race walking.
The results of racing events are decided by finishing position
(or time, where measured), while the jumps and throws are
won by the athlete that achieves the highest or furthest
measurement from a series of attempts. The simplicity of the
competitions, and the lack of a need for expensive
equipment, makes athletics one of the most commonly
competed sports in the world. Athletics is mostly an
individual sport, with the exception of relay races and
competitions which combine athletes' performances for a
team score, such as cross country.

Organized athletics are traced back to the Ancient Olympic

Games from 776 BC. The rules and format of the modern
events in athletics were defined in Western Europe and North
America in the 19th and early 20th century, and were then
spread to other parts of the world. Most modern top level
meetings are conducted by the International Association of
Athletics Federations and its member federations.
The athletics meeting forms the backbone of the Summer
Olympics. The foremost international athletics meeting is the
IAAF World Championships in Athletics, which incorporates
track and field, marathon running and race walking. Other
top level competitions in athletics include the IAAF World
Cross Country Championships and the IAAF World Half
Marathon Championships. Athletes with a physical disability
compete at the Summer Paralympics and the World Para
Athletics Championships.

The word athletics is derived from the Ancient Greek ἀθλητής

(athlētēs, "combatant in public games") from ἆθλον (athlon,
"prize") or ἆθλος (athlos, "competition").[2] Initially, the term
was used to describe athletic contests in general – i.e.
sporting competition based primarily on human physical
feats. In the 19th century, the term athletics acquired a more
narrow definition in Europe and came to describe sports
involving competitive running, walking, jumping and
throwing. This definition continues to be the most prominent
one in the United Kingdom and most of the areas of the
former British Empire. Furthermore, foreign words in many
Germanic and Romance languages which are related to the
term athletics also have a similar meaning.
In much of North America, athletics is synonymous with
sports in general, maintaining a more historical usage of the
term. The word "athletics" is rarely used to refer to the sport
of athletics in this region. Track and field is preferred, and is
used in the United States and Canada to refer to most
athletics events, including racewalking and marathon
running (although cross country running is typically
considered as a separate sport).

Athletic contests in running, walking, jumping and

throwing are among the oldest of all sports and their roots
are prehistoric.[3] Athletics events were depicted in the
Ancient Egyptian tombs in Saqqara, with illustrations of
running at the Heb Sed festival and high jumping appearing
in tombs from as early as of 2250 BC.[4] The Tailteann
Games were an ancient Celtic festival in Ireland, founded
circa 1800 BC, and the thirty-day meeting included running
and stone-throwing among its sporting events.[5] The
original and only event at the first Olympics in 776 BC was a
stadium-length running event known as the stadion. This
later expanded to include throwing and jumping events
within the ancient pentathlon. Athletics competitions also
took place at other Panhellenic Games, which were founded
later around 500 BC.[6]

Modern era
Edit
The Cotswold Olimpick Games, a sports festival which
emerged in 17th century England, featured athletics in the
form of sledgehammer throwing contests.[7] Annually, from
1796 to 1798, L'Olympiade de la République was held in
revolutionary France, and is an early forerunner to the
modern Olympic Games. The premier event of this
competition was a running event, but various ancient Greek
disciplines were also on display. The 1796 Olympiade
marked the introduction of the metric system into the
sport.[8]

Athletics competitions were held about 1812 at the Royal

Military College, Sandhurst,[9] and in 1840 in Shrewsbury,
Shropshire at the Royal Shrewsbury School Hunt. The Royal
Military Academy at Woolwich held an organised competition
in 1849, and a regular series of closed meetings open only to
undergraduates, was held by Exeter College, Oxford from
1850.[10] The annual Wenlock Olympian Games, first held in
1850 in Wenlock, England, incorporated athletics events into
its sports programme.[11]

The first modern-style indoor athletics meetings were

recorded shortly after in the 1860s, including a meet at
Ashburnham Hall in London which featured four running
events and a triple jump competition.[12][13]

The Amateur Athletic Association (AAA) was established in

England in 1880 as the first national body for the sport of
athletics and began holding its own annual athletics
competition – the AAA Championships. The United States
also began holding an annual national competition – the USA
Outdoor Track and Field Championships – first held in 1876
by the New York Athletic Club.[14] Athletics became codified
and standardized via the English AAA and other general
sports organisations in the late 19th century, such as the
Amateur Athletic Union (founded in the US in 1888) and the
Union des sociétés françaises de sports athlétiques (founded
in France in 1889).

An athletics competition was included in the first modern

Olympic Games in 1896 and it has been as one of the
foremost competitions at the quadrennial multi-sport event
ever since. Originally for men only, the 1928 Olympics saw
the introduction of women's events in the athletics
programme. Athletics is part of the Paralympic Games since
the inaugural Games in 1960. Athletics has a very high-
profile during major championships, especially the Olympics,
but otherwise is less popular.

An international governing body, the International Amateur

Athletics Federation (IAAF), was founded in 1912; it adopted
its current name, the International Association of Athletics
Federations, in 2001. The IAAF established separate outdoor
World Championships in 1983. In modern times, athletes can
receive money for racing, putting an end to the so-called
"amateurism" that existed before.

The Comité International Sports des Sourds had been formed

by 1922, to govern international deaf sports, including
athletics.[15]

The first organized international competitions for athletes

with a physical disability (not deaf) began in 1952, when the
first international Stoke Mandeville Games were organized
for World War II veterans.[15][16] This only included athletes
in a wheelchair. This inspired the first Paralympic Games,
held in 1960. Competitions would over time be expanded to
include mainly athletes with amputations, cerebral palsy and
visual impairment, in addition to wheelchair events